Hyperledger, an open source collaborative effort created to advance blockchain, has announced a diverse line-up of eight new members, including the Ethereum Foundation, Microsoft, Nornickel and Salesforce. Hyperledger also added a new identity infrastructure project that spotlights interoperability, cross project development and broad community involvement.
“Our journey in the blockchain ecosystem has brought us a long way, and now is the time for us to join the Hyperledger community,” said Marley Gray, Principal Architect, Blockchain Engineering at Microsoft. “We are proud of our contributions to such a diverse blockchain ecosystem, from our Azure service offerings and developer toolkits to our leadership in driving open specifications. We look forward to contributing to the community’s projects as well as initiating new ones based on emerging standards.”
The 8 new members
The eight new members are:
- CAICT (China Academy of Information and Communications Technology)
- Ethereum Foundation
- Gloscad
- GS1 US
- Microsoft
- Milligan Partners
- Nornickel
- SalesForce.
The striking new support comes with the addition of Microsoft and SalesForce. With both companies already having considerable blockchain expertise and initiatives, welcoming them to the Hyperledger community is a boost for the Linux Foundation’s promotion of blockchain.
Hyperledger projects and special interest groups
Hyperledger is a multi-venture, multi-stakeholder effort hosted at the Linux Foundation. It includes various enterprise blockchain and distributed ledger technologies.
Hyperledger offers organisations (private and public) the opportunity to create industry-specific applications, platforms and hardware blockchain systems which support their individual business transactions. The objective is to enable enterprise-grade, open source distributed ledger frameworks and code bases.
With the recent launch of Hyperledger Aries, there are now a total 13 projects in the Hyperledger greenhouse. These include :
- Aries
- Burrow
- Caliper
- Cello
- Composer
- Explorer
- Fabric
- Grid
- Indy
- Iroha
- Quilt
- Sawtooth
- Ursa.
Besides these a Supply Chain Special Interest Group (SIG) has started work. This is the sixth SIG with the others covering:
- healthcare
- public sector
- social impact
- telecom
- trade finance.
“Our new members illustrate the breadth of organizations that see the value of contributing to the Hyperledger community,” said Brian Behlendorf, Executive Director, Hyperledger. “The mix of blue chip technology companies, international organizations, logistics and manufacturing players and academia that have joined us from point around the world show the widespread interest and investment in open source enterprise blockchain technologies. This broad-based involvement is what drives our expanding portfolio of open source projects, which are fully conceived, developed and advanced by the ever-growing Hyperledger community.”
Enterprise Times: what does this mean
With the addition of these eight new members, Hyperledger now has some 200 members. Beside the new eight, well recognised names include Airbus, Aetna, Amex, Cisco, Daimler, Deutsche Bank, Intel, IBM, JP Morgan, NEC, Oracle, SAP and others. Part of the attraction is that Hyperledger supports an open community which takes contributions and participation from its diverse member base.
Though the Hyperledger member list was already impressive, the addition of Microsoft and Salesforce adds two notable absentees. However, another major investor in blockchain, Facebook which announced its Libra cryptocurrency, is not a Hyperledger member – preferring to develop its own blockchain technology. Might it one day feel obliged to participate? Hyperledger has momentum.
